The hustlers talk about runway.

In the finance world, it’s how many months a business has before it runs out of cash.

A couple of years ago I stepped off the treadmill, thinking that I had a novel in me, and that if I could just focus my energy full time on that, I’d have a bestseller in no time.

Here’s the part where I tell you that I finished it in record time, beta readers loved it, but I just struggled to find an agent, or a publisher.

What happened was that I got about 85% done, panicked, thinking that I’d put all the eggs in that basket, and that if this failed, then I’d have nothing left, that I’d have nuked my life personally, professionally, and financially for no good reason.

Rather than facing that, I just tapped out.

Stalled.

It’s been sitting there, nearly done, for over a year now.

And today I’m taking a 2nd interview for a job that won’t replace even half of what I really need to make the ends meet.

Because the runway’s about gone.

And I need to start building another one.

What I hate about the runway as a term is that as an airplane fixated guy, I think of runways as places to launch from/land on.

The finance term is more Tim Gunn than Top Gun.

So I’ll take that second interview.

Get me a grader.

Start ploughing under the old runway.

Start a new one.